Photography
by taitofan
Summary: Rira has a special surprise, but Kogomi isn't exactly pleased to see it...


Photography

by Taitofan

Rated PG-13 for yuri

Disclaimer: Let's see, no canon yaoi, yuri, crossbreeding, or interesting het… Nope, Pokémon is definitely not mine.

Author's note: It's been so long since I've written pure shoujo ai… Ack. But TS-danna wanted shoujo ai, so shoujo ai it is! What to say… Well Rira hasn't shown up in the anime yet, so I kinda had to go with my impression of her personality. Sorry if it's terribly OOC. I've never written about any of the Frontier Brains or played Emerald actually, so please bear with me. There are also two miniscule mentions of shounen ai if you squint. Kudos if you can find them and know who I'm talking about.

Dedicated to Tropical Spirit at SPPf for his birthday. Sorry it took so long dear! Hopefully the girls will make up for the wait.

Flames do nothing but make me laugh, although I'll listen to any CC you have. Please read, review, and enjoy! Finished 2-20-06

* * *

Kogomi was only mildly surprised when Rira showed up at the Battle Arena. After all, her lilac-haired friend had a knack for knowing when she'd be taking her days off. She was, however, rather surprised when she noticed that the other girl had come carrying two large envelopes. And she was _very_ surprised when Rira told her what was actually in the envelopes.

"Come again?" She questioned, not believing her ears.

"The pictures from the Battle Frontier grand opening. I asked Enishida if he could get copies of the ones you and I took. You do remember, don't you?"

Kogomi remembered all right. Too well. Enishida had asked all of the Frontier Brains to take pictures at the grand opening to "preserve their memories," or something like that… She didn't remember his exact reasoning, but she'd gone along with it because Rira had thought it was a good idea. But that had been a long time ago, and she'd never thought anyone would ever know which pictures were hers…

"Of course I do. But why did you want my pictures too?" Rira smiled at the question, as if the answer was obvious.

"Because you're my best friend of course. I wanted to know how you saw the biggest day of our lives. It's just too bad that Enishida took so long to get our pictures developed…" Frankly, Kogomi would have preferred that he'd forgotten about them all together, but she smiled as calmly as she could regardless.

"Yeah, too bad…" Either Rira didn't notice her lack of enthusiasm, or she chose to ignore it.

"Well, now we finally have them. So, whose do you want to look at first? Yours or mine?"

"Yours," Kogomi sighed, figuring that this was she'd have a few more minutes before the time of reckoning came. Rira nodded, opening the envelope marked "Rira" and taking out the stack of photos.

The photos were beautiful, just as Kogomi knew they'd be. They all had perfect lighting and were perfectly centered. And the array of subjects was probably what Enishida had in mind when he'd told them to capture memories. There was a picture of herself and Azami chatting, which surprised her, as she didn't even know that Rira had been there. There was one of Hiisu chatting up a purple-haired cosplayer who she'd never seen. Another one featured Datsura engaged in a deep conversation with a refined looking man who she recognized as one of the Houen gym leaders. Even an action shot of Jindai and Ukon battling for a crowd of visitors was flawlessly aligned. In short, they were breathtaking.

"Well, they weren't terrible," Rira mused as she placed the photographs carefully back in their envelope and set it on the ground. Kogomi rolled her eyes, wondering why the girl always sold herself short. "Now for yours."

"Hey!" Kogomi exclaimed enthusiastically, hoping to distract her friend, "You must be tired! Or hungry! Or thirsty! Why don't we just go in the dojo and—" But it was too late. Rira was already opening up the envelope and taking out its contents. The blonde could do nothing but watch silently and wait for her reaction…

Rira flipped through the pictures slowly, paying close attention to each and every one. She stayed quiet the entire time, her expression not changing from its calm look even once. It was making Kogomi rather nervous, as out of character as that was. _Anger_ she could handle, _surprise_ she could handle… Indifference was one thing she could _not_ handle right now.

"You really have quite the eye for photography," she finally said quietly, a small smile playing on her lips. "You really should take a look at them." Kogomi already knew what they looked like of course, but she accepted the small stack regardless.

They certainly weren't as striking as Rira's but they had their own unique charm. The there were only a few blurry spots, and _almost_ everything was centered. But it wasn't her skill with a camera that was remarkable, but rather the subject of each and every picture. _Rira_ greeting a little girl. _Rira_ signing an autograph for a fanboy. _Rira_ eating lunch. _Rira_ giving part of her onigiri to a wild Poppo. Every picture had the lilac-haired girl as the focus. It probably wasn't what Enishida had had in mind, but he _had_ asked for their view of the day. And Rira was the focus of all of her days.

"Rira, I…" She never got any further than that, because a delicate finger pressed against her lips.

"You don't have to explain," Rira murmured softly, her eyes shining with something that the blonde couldn't quite identify. "Just tell me if this means what I think it means." Kogomi was tempted to ask, '_What do you mean_?' but decided that it wouldn't be worth it. Instead, she just took a deep breath…

"Yes."

And that was all the answer Rira needed.

The pictures were hastily shoved back into their envelope before being tossed aside. Eventually they'd be brought inside when the girls decided that the ground wasn't a very comfortable place to explore their newfound feelings. Words would eventually be shared as well; beautiful declarations of hidden love on both sides and regrets for not saying anything sooner. But sometimes actions speak louder than words, and it would be a very long time before their lips were unoccupied long enough to say anything.

And by the day's end, Kogomi had a new respect for the fine art of photography.


End file.
